so ive been a tech for about two years now and mostly just been doing 2m/70cm stuff, some APRS, talked on a few nets. honestly been putting off upgrading forever because the general exam always seemed intimidating but my buddy at the club keeps bugging me to just do it so here i am.

started going through the question pool and some of it makes sense but a lot of the electrical theory stuff is really tripping me up. like the reactance questions and the stuff about impedance matching, i kind of get it conceptually but when they ask me to actually calculate something im lost. is that stuff heavily tested or can i more or less just memorize the answers without really understanding it

also i guess my bigger question is once i actually pass, what does HF actually feel like compared to VHF. like is it just immediately different or does it take a while to figure out. i dont even have an HF rig yet so i guess im getting ahead of myself but curious what people think

the math stuff on the general exam is honestly not as bad as it looks. theres only like a handful of actual calculation questions and if you know ohms law and can do basic stuff with the reactance formulas you'll be fine. i spent way too long freaking out about it and then the actual test had maybe 2 or 3 questions that required any real math. just go through the question pool with something like HamStudy and youll start recognizing patterns pretty quick.

as for HF vs VHF, yeah its a completely different world. i remember the first time i worked someone in europe on 20m with like 100 watts and a dipole in my attic i just sat there kind of stunned. propagation is this whole thing you start paying attention to and it kind of gets into your head. you'll be checking the solar flux index every morning like a weather report before you know it. just get the ticket first and worry about the radio after, plenty of cheap used HF rigs out there once youre ready

im basically in the same boat as you, tech for 3 years and just started the general pool last month. the electrical theory i just brute forced honestly, like i looked up enough youtube videos that eventually some of it clicked but for the questions i really couldnt wrap my head around i just memorized the answer. probably not the right approach but whatever it works for passing the test lol

havent taken mine yet, scheduled for next saturday so fingers crossed